2023 Early Hearing Detection & Intervention Conference

March 5-7, 2023 • Cincinnati, OH

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6/06/2017  |   9:15 AM - 9:30 AM   |  Feast or famine: The challenge of nitrogen removal in treatment wetlands   |  301B

Feast or famine: The challenge of nitrogen removal in treatment wetlands

Constructed wetlands have been used since the 1950s to reduce biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and total suspended solids (TSS) concentrations in wastewater. However, with the increased occurrence of harmful algal blooms and hypoxia in lakes and coastal waters, cost-effective methods for nutrient removal are needed. Phosphorus removal is largely due to sorption and particulate settling; thus, designing wetlands to remove phosphorus is relatively straight-forward. In comparison, the main removal pathway for nitrogen is by conversion of organic nitrogen to inorganic nitrogen and then to dinitrogen gas via denitrification. Because each of these processes is mediated primarily by microorganisms, understanding microbial ecology is critical to designing treatment wetlands to remove nitrogen. Development of such a treatment train in a wetland system requires balancing the necessary supplies of electron donors and electron acceptors for each type of microorganism while also providing the proper redox conditions for the growth of both aerobes and anaerobes. This presentation illustrates the challenge of achieving high levels of nitrogen removal using constructed wetlands.

  • C36 Water Resource Management
  • C09 Wetland Ecology
  • S04 Natural and Constructed Wetlands – improving water quality and watershed health

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Presenters/Authors

Tess Thompson (), Virginia Tech, tthompson@vt.edu;


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